Bound By a Mighty Vow

Sisterhood and Women's Fraternities, 1870-1920

Diana B. Turk

Publication Year: 2004

Sororities are often thought of as exclusive clubs for socially inclined college students, but Bound by a Mighty Vow, a history of the women's Greek system, demonstrates that these organizations have always served more serious purposes. Diana Turk explores the founding and development of the earliest sororities (then called women's fraternities) and explains how these groups served as support networks to help the first female collegians succeed in the hostile world of nineteenth century higher education.

Turk goes on to look at how and in what ways sororities changed over time. While the first generation focused primarily on schoolwork, later Greek sisters used their fraternity connections to ensure social status, gain access to jobs and job training, and secure financial and emotional support as they negotiated life in turn-of-the-century America. The costs they paid were conformity to certain tightly prescribed beliefs of how "ideal" fraternity women should act and what "ideal" fraternity women should do.

Drawing on primary source documents written and preserved by the fraternity women themselves, as well as on oral history interviews conducted with fraternity officers and alumnae members, Bound by a Mighty Vow uncovers the intricate history of these early women's networks and makes a bold statement about the ties that have bound millions of American women to one another in the name of sisterhood.

Contents

Preface

In the years spent researching and writing this book, I have learned that
people are rarely neutral on the subject of Greek-letter fraternities. Some
praise these organizations for their positive influences, while others condemn
them as shallow, elitist, and unworthy of scholarly attention.
The purpose of this book is to explore the meaning of sisterhood for...

Acknowledgments

I could not have written this book without the support, guidance, and gentle
prodding of many people. My deepest gratitude and indebtedness go to
Hasia R. Diner, my adviser, mentor, and friend, who saw the value in this
study even before I did and who, through her own example and constant
support and guidance, pushed me to stick with the project and bring it to...

Introduction: Fraternities’ Past and Historians’ Present

On May 17, 1875, a student at Asbury College in Greencastle,
Indiana, waited alone in a darkened hallway for her initiation ceremony
to begin. On the other side of the doorway, the sisters of Kappa
Alpha Theta Fraternity prepared for the ritual that would transform the
young woman from a “barbarian,” or nonfraternity student, into a...

1 Of Serious Mind and Purpose: The First Generation of Fraternity Women

On January 27, 1870, four women at Asbury College in
Greencastle, Indiana, gathered together in a darkened room and initiated
themselves into a secret society. Pledging lifelong vows of loyalty to one
another and swearing to uphold a set of carefully outlined ideals, these
four students conceived of and established Kappa Alpha Theta, the first...

2 The Most Socially Eligible: “At Home” with the
Second Generation of Fraternity Women

The dire predictions regarding the health of women who attended
college proved groundless, and in the 1880s, a larger number of
schools opened their doors to female students. According to historian of
women’s education Mabel Newcomer, whereas roughly 4,600 women
had attended coeducational colleges in 1870, by 1890 that number had...

3 A National Society to Rank with the First in America: Expansion and Exclusion
in the Women’s Greek System

Upon taking their oaths of loyalty to Kappa Alpha Theta,
Kappa Kappa Gamma, or any of the other leading women’s fraternities,
new initiates became part of a nationwide fraternal network and not just
of the particular chapter into which they were initiated. The vows required
of sisters, that they pledge to “befriend and to comfort, to assist...

4 In Search of Unity: Fostering “High Ideals” in the Face of
Antifraternity Sentiment, 1910–1920

The early years of the twentieth century saw enormous
growth in the women’s Greek system. Between 1898 and 1912, the number
of women pledged to fraternities skyrocketed, from nearly 12,000 to
almost 40,000. Within ten years, the number had expanded still further,
to 113,000 by 1923.1 Yet even as they blossomed, the women’s fraternities...

5 Once a Sister, Always a Sister: Fraternity Membership
in the Postcollege Years

By the early 1910s, fraternity alumnae outnumbered their collegiate
sisters by as many as seven to one and played vital roles in the governing,
training, and general management of their organizations. The
leaders of Kappa Alpha Theta, Kappa Kappa Gamma, Alpha Phi, Pi Beta
Phi, and other women’s fraternities relied on alumnae members to provide...

6 Bound by a Mighty Vow: The Costs and Benefits of
Fraternity Membership, 1870–1920

From the time of their founding through the first decades of
the twentieth century, the women’s Greek-letter fraternities used
metaphors such as Theta’s “linked chain” to describe the relationship between
their members and the organizations. “Bound together” by a
“mighty vow of sisterhood,” each fraternity woman drew strength from...

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